


Full Circle

by White_Rabbits_Clock



Series: Wayfarer [2]
Category: The Hobbit - All Media Types
Genre: Crafty!Bilbo, Dragon!Bilbo, Dragons, Gen, M/M, Non-Canonical, Violence, Zombies
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-02-06
Updated: 2016-07-16
Packaged: 2018-05-18 14:45:41
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 16
Words: 19,021
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5932138
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/White_Rabbits_Clock/pseuds/White_Rabbits_Clock
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Bilbo Baggins is a reaper, apprentice of Smaug, son of Smaug's enemy, the dragon king Victor von Thorne. When Bilbo loses Thorin at the end of the journey, he goes back to the archipelago he was born on to confront those who tried to hunt he and his dwarves down. He goes to find the reason behind Smaug's madness- the same madness that eventually led Bilbo to kill him, and maybe start a war in retribution.</p><p>UPDATE 3.28.16: As of today, this an every other work/series of mine is on semi/full hiatus. Updates will be sporadic at best and nonexistent at worse. They are not abandoned. I'm just working on too much stuff right now.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Prologue

_ Bilbo’s eyes open, but only slightly. He doesn’t wish to be awake. Not today, anyways. He hears movement nearby, smells the distinctive and faint scent of an elven king.  _

_ “I asked you to kill me,” he rasps. The elf does not jump, but it’s a near thing, when one is tending a creature more beast than anything else. He hadn’t realized that his charge was awake. _

_ “So you did. Gandalf mentioned some unfinished business that you have. He also requested I point out that if you really wanted to be dead, you would do it yourself.” Bilbo opens his eyes fully and carefully rolls his head. His whole body hurts right now. _

_ “The person I bound my soul to is dead. You of all people should know what that means, elf.” _

_ “I, of all people, understand the greater weight that needing to live has over wanting to die, dragon,” Thranduil says, understanding etched deep into his eyes.  _

_ “Did you?” Bilbo says after a few moments of silence. His gaze is too direct, eyes to sightful for such a question, but he doesn’t care. He wants Thorin back, and this elf did not let Bilbo die and go to him like he requested.  _

_ “Yes.” Thranduil finally answers after nearly a full minute of staring. _

_ “Yes, I did.” Bilbo breaks his gaze, turning to gaze at the cloth ceiling. _

_ “Then I’m disinclined to think this is something petty, done out of revenge.” _

_ “You’re bandages need changing.” _

_ “If it’s all the same to you, piss off.” the dragon snaps. Thranduil gives him one last, proud gaze, then he’s gone. _


	2. Mandragora

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Dragon-y things happen.

Bilbo fights the seer’s attacks, pulling himself back from that memory. 

_ Piss off. I’ll come and dessicate you soon enough. _ He thinks with a final mental push. He seems to glide up the beach, large, immersive hood thrown forwards to hide his face, the only thing visible is mass of jet black, curling hair. His hands are hidden in the wide sleeves of his coat.

Halfway to the large rock hills, two dragons emerge from the mist around the isle. Bilbo does not stop, trusting the bared amulet hanging around his neck to be enough. 

“Ezra,” one of them rumbles. The dragon does not stop, walking forwards and directly into the wall, which has a glamour so powerful it actually feels like Bilbo’s swimming through honey. A few moments later, though, and he’s emerging into the great and glorious Dark Citadel of the Lilac Isles.

One of his companions lead the way, and the other trails him closely as they proceed. Through darkened doorways, Ezra is aware of the presence of the citadel’s soldiers- masters at deception, all. Though it’d be faster, no one flies tonight; too easy to lose the infamous son of Victor von Thorne if they’re in the air. 

Eventually, after the walk of four hours of shortcuts and back alleys to shorten the time, they come to a great house. The two escorts see Bilbo inside and too a mat, which the dragon stands in front of, but does not take a seat.

“Ezra,” in the warm, gold light of the lanterns a dragon, already seated, materializes. 

“Mandragora.” The dragon rises, her eyes a deep, emerald green. She paces around him so slowly Bilbo thinks she’s about to attack him. It takes some will not to attack first. 

“Skittish as ever,” she says after a moment. 

“Get to the point. What do you want?”

“Why are you back?”

“I felt like it.”

“Dragonshit,” she spits, already pissed.

“Temper, temper,” he murmurs as he steps after her so that they’re nearly chest to chest. 

“You’re going back to them, aren’t you?”

“Back to who?”

“Them. You’re father. The family who didn’t want you. You’re going to the Lavender Isles, aren’t you?” Beneath his hood, Bilbo’s mouth twists up into an ugly little smile. 

“Did you think I would just let whatever comes happen?”

“I thought you’d have more sense than to run back into the arms of your enemy.”

“Is that what they are? Enemies?”

“Yes,” Mandragora breathes. There’s something very wrong with her guest, and she can’t figure out what it is.

“Why? Because they kept me prisoner? Because they disliked me and found me tiresome? Because they did not care?”

“The first… and the last. They tried to marry you off. They beat you. They-”

“Did more than you,” Bilbo lets out. It’s a phrase said so quietly that Mandragora almost misses it. But she doesn’t.

“You know what peace depends on,” she says lowly. Bilbo remembers, suddenly. That he does.

 

…

 

_ “YOU KNEW I WAS THERE!” he screamed at her. In front of him and to the right, a plume of smoke exploded and half formed two women before disappearing as quickly as it had come.  _

_ “Ez-” the woman said, her white hair as wild as his, though she’d made an effort to tame her’s. _

_ “YOU LET ME ROT!” his voice broke on this next part as more smoke appeared everywhere; he was dangerously close to getting physical. _

_ “You were going to let me get married,” he got out, sinking down, knees against the grass. His black curls resisted when he shoved his hands into his hair, claws scraping his scalp and drawing blood. _

_ “Ezra, peace here- the same peace you make so much use of, now, depends on not provoking war. Stealing the son of the patriarch would have ended all you have seen here. It would have cost us countless bodies. Gallons of blood,” Mandragora pushed as she kneels in front of him and pulled at his wrist. It sounded worth it, but Ezra heard the real meaning. He wasn’t valuable enough. And when was he ever? _

_ “Get the fuck away from me,” he whispered. Lock was right. He was always right. His breathing was too fast. It was too hard to concentrate. Mandragora didn’t want him. Man- _

_ “Ezra,” a voice says. He looked up, eyes wide and round. Lock stood there, staring down at him, gaze even and steady. _

_ “As glad as I am that you see, now,” He crouches and grips Ezra’s shoulders with both hands, “I’d rather avoid this part.” _

_ “Mmh,” he says, noise coming from the back of his throat. When his breathing moves through deep, long breaths to normal ones in the space of ten minutes.  _

_ “With me, then?” A nod, then Lock helped him to stand. _

 

…

 

He was young, then. Young and wild and stupid, too. Now he knows better than to expect anything from Mandragora that he doesn’t strong-arm her into doing. 

“No. Your comfort depended on leaving me be. Now, then, since this trip seems to be all but wasted, answer a question of mine. Who is the seer that haunts me?”

“As far as I can tell, there isn’t even a seer that knows of your existence, let alone how to get inside your head.”

“Useful as ever, Mandragora,” he murmurs as he steps back, spins on his heel, and heads for the door.

“I’ll take my leave, now. And, as a warning,” he turns around and extends one hand towards the white-haired dragon.

“Stay out of the way. Wouldn’t, after all, want to destroy your fragile peace,” then he’s invisible, ready to leave when-

“Stay the night. I owe you that much.” She says. But Bilbo is already gone.

 

…

 

_ Things were so simple, when they were little. Xerxes’ chubby little baby hands toyed with wooden blocks. His mouth was open in a grin as he giggled, the brightly painted yellow object his for the moment.  _

_ Aesop, across from him, watched in silent wonder. Xerxes was always happy. And noisy. Far too noisy. Aesop, a year older, dark baby curls that much longer, pushed himself up, toddled over, and claimed the block to the anger and screaming of the younger.  _

_ It was the beginning of something wonderful. _


	3. Bloody Present

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Bilbo goes back to the island Lock trained him on.

 

On one of the islands between Lilac and Lavender, deep in a state of outer desolation, rises a rock wall that extends all the way around it. The grey, rough stone is tall and jagged, with room for two or three fully formed dragons in their greater shapes to sleep and live comfortably there. You wouldn’t know it, though. 

Few have dared to fly over it, and even fewer to set foot past the part of the beach where the tide reaches. It’s here that Bilbo, transforming from the fish’s body he’d travelled here in and into the man’s body he usually uses, launches himself up onto the beach and, under a cloak of invisibility, heads confidently up the familiar sands, cloak swaying behind him sluggishly, as heavy fabric should. 

He finds the hidden entrance- none fly over the wall- with ease and steps inside. What he sees almost brings him to his knees with the memories here. 

 

…

 

_ “Ezra! Come look,” Lock called. The younger dragon scrabbles over wet stone and through darkness to the secret tidepools, where all manner of sea life has been caught in the illusion of safety.  _

_ “What’s that?” Lock asks, pointing to a creature with more than three arms. For his part, Ezra stares, transfixed by this strange creature that looks so soft but is actually rough to the touch.  _

_ “A starfish,” he says finally. He leans in closer and narrows his eyes. It’s so pretty. _

_ “Think you can shapeshift into it?” An eager headnod, and then Ezra’s growing smaller, body compressing. He lets out a groan as he passes what’s comfortable for him, but otherwise doesn’t stop until a large, red starfish is flexing its arms gleefully. He had done it. _

_ “Impressive. You’re turning out to be quite the Cursed.” Lock praised. He sees the visible flinch in his student as the dragon starts to shift back. _

_ “I’m not Cursed.” _

_ “You are.” _

_ “Am not.” he says, a little more fiercely. _

_ “It’s your heritage, boy. Learn to accept it.” Lock says, narrow eyed gaze on his student. _

_ “It’s a name.” _

_ “One owned, way out here,” Lock says, knowing he’s won. _

 

…

 

The abode is simple enough; worked and worn walls protecting an inner glade of grass and small trees. To his left are overgrown fruit-bearing plants. He remembers being shown how to tend them. To the right’s an arena of sorts where he first learned basic swordsmanship. The air of nostalgia stays on him, and he steps within the worn dirt-and-stone ring and draws his rapier.

One-two-three-jab fall-back left-step again. Yes. That was what he had him doing for hours. Up on your toes. One-two-three-... he trails off, looking first down at his feet and then towards the cave. There’s a footprint on the ground. A footprint that matched neither Bilbo’s nor Lock’s. How interesting. 

He wanders over and into the dark maw, on the alert for intruders. The gleam of his sword disappears along with the rest of his body. 

“What the hell are you doing here?” Bilbo blurts in surprise. Archemydes opens his eyes and gazes in pain and amusement at his longtime friend. 

“Bleeding, as it turns out,” he wheezes with some trace of irony. Bilbo falls to his knees, sheaths his rapier, and carefully peels away the layers until he finds ebony skin and a shit ton of blood shining through dirtied bandages.

“How bad?” he asks, carefully passing broad, careful hands over the rest of his injured counterpart. 

“Eight.”

“Oh. Brace yourself, then.” Bilbo says as he rises and trots out of the cave. Between it and the vines, there leads a hidden, sandy path down to more hollowed out spaces underneath the rock boundary, where the pools are, on one side, salt water from the tide and, on the other, freshwater, from captured rain leaking from long, glistening stalactites. 

He kicks rocks out of the way, fueled by the sense of urgency that he had been bereft of just a few moments ago. As soon as the floor’s cleared, he takes flight again and launches himself out of the slightly too narrow opening. It took him forever to perfect that trick. He pulls a sharp turn, feet all but touching the ground, and launches himself into the cave again. Abruptly broadened wings brings him to a sudden halt. There is a moment of transition when gravity seems to have left him before its rooting him once more.

Archemydes blinks opens his eyes as he’s surrounded by the red wings of his old and former lover. Arms he used to know well coax him up into familiar limbs that were once so untrained that this would have been too much

“Brace yourself,” says a growl from above his head. Then the both of them are hurtling through the cave, back ‘round to the rock entrance, and down to the pools. 

“Fresh or salt?” Bilbo barks.

“Fresh.” Archemydes bites back a groan as Bilbo falls to his knees and carefully sets him on the edge of a rock pool with a natural seat. Bilbo never lets go of him as he wrests his shirt and then his breeches, his ever-shifting body making short work of his bandages. By the time he’s done with Archemydes, Bilbo’s got four different arms.

A low whistle pierces the air as the bag Bilbo never set down comes open and medicines come out.

“Someone made an example of you.”

“Aye,” Archemydes says with a flash of teeth. The pale palms of his hands and soles of his feet stand out like a firefly in eternal darkness as red hands gently check him over. Bilbo disappears briefly before actual light is flooding the cave near them.

A lantern. Bilbo has a lantern. 

It takes an hour and a half before Bilbo is satisfied that Archemydes won’t croak before the older dragon’s allowed out of the pool. He feels slightly more like himself as Bilbo makes to pick him  up again. He’s still naked as a blue jay, and the fact’s being stoically ignored. 

“I’d extend an invitation, but that’d be a bit on the crass side, now wouldn’t it?” not even a blink as Archemydes hoisted back to the cave, where the fire that had already been on its last legs before Bilbo arrived had completely bit the dust.

He’s not settled among the furs- they’ve all been very, very used already, but Bilbo grants him access to the flames as he gathers up the old and well- preserved piles and moves off. He’ll wash them today, then hang them to dry. 

Archemydes wonders if Bilbo ever did this for Thorin.


	4. Done

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Bilbo and Archemydes spend a little time together.

_ Xerxes’ friends had, one by one, presented, been apprenticed, and had no more time for powerless little freaks like himself. There was just Aesop left, and he was an angry little fellow who didn’t much like Xerxes. _

_ Currently, Aesop was ignoring him in favor of investigating the beach. _

_ “The tide’s coming in!” Xerxes called. They were well past the time when they should have presented, and knew more about their surroundings than anyone else did; that’s all they had to learn about. _

_ “So go home,” Aesop said in a trademark brush-off. He stood on the damp sand, toes refusing to sink into it, and felt the moody waters wash against his feet. He wanted to leave.  _

_ “Aes-” _

_ “Go. Home.” _

_ “You do realize I don’t have one, right?” Aesop turned with a barely arched eyebrow. Long and lean and just a bit too thin, it was easy to tell Aesop’s status; there was no one to take care of him (his father was dead, his mother claimed by the Fog of grief, and so would be following shortly after). Fiery, molten eyes slid down Xerxes own broader body, how he seemed to have no trouble getting enough to eat, how he had good clothing. How he probably has a fairly new bed to sleep in. _

_ “You have a roof that doesn’t leak,” Aesop says as he takes a step towards him. _

_ “Food that isn’t rotten,” another step. _

_ “People who are capable of focusing on anything, even if it’s not you,” a third step. _

_ “So don’t tell me about what you do and don’t have,” a fourth and fifth step. _

_ “Pampered brat.” it’s then that Xerxes tackles Aesop. _

_ How dare he? rings in his head as he wraps his hands around Aesop’s neck and squeezes. How dare he tell Xerxes what he does and doesn’t have? How dare he throw away the only chance at friendship he’ll ever have? they’re seventy five and seventy six, respectively. They’re not going to develope powers. Xerxes will never take the throne. Aesop will never be what his father was.  _

_ So how dare he cast Xerxes off, too? _

_ Two feet in his stomach knock the breath from him.  _

_ “And you DON’T?!” he screams as he gains the upper hand once more. _

_ “NO!” Aesop says as they roll and the thinner dragon is on top again.  _

_ “They never come for me. Just for Pan.” Pan, his mother. Pan, who is on the verge of death. Why would they care? They only keep him alive because it’s unheard of to kill a baby dragon, regardless of powers. But they’re nearly grown now. Xerxes pushes himself up with Aesop still sitting on him, all the fight gone. _

_ He wraps both arms around the dragon and just holds him for a bit. _

…

 

Bilbo jolts awake, sweaty and exhilarated and feeling very strange. 

Aesop and Xerxes, the birth names of Victor von Thorne and Smaug. Once upon a time, the enemies had been on a beach on the cusp of manhood and… nothing, because Ezra woke up. The dragon gets the sense that this is a different seer who’s given him this memory. This is someone who wants him to know. 

He rises and stokes the fire to full life with the dried plant matter and what little wood there is to have on an island. He’ll have to find pete at some point. He wonders if any of the mountain goats are still around. Lock had never let him eat them to extinction, after all. 

He turns to Archemydes and finds his friend watching him.

“What’ve you come to do?”

“Take a wild guess.”

“Die, I’d say. Speaking of, are you alright?” Bilbo pins him with a narrow eyed gaze.

“Right. Right. Don’t ask the obvious. As it is, we can’t really stay here forever. So, what are you going to do?”

“I’m tired of this fighting between the Cursed and the Blessed. It nearly cost the company their lives. It has nearly cost me mine. You, yours. Hundreds, thousands of dragons have lost their lives and their families to this load of shit. I’m done.” Bilbo finishes quietly. 

He remembers, a very long time ago, when he said those exact same words.

 

…

 

_ It was cold- freezing, even. He’d been in the deserts beyond the blue mountains for years, and he’d never had a high tolerance to heat. He gazed out over the landscape beyond the Carrock at the mountain, invisible to nearly every sense. _

_ “Five years.” Archemydes said, standing behind him. He hasn’t done this for years, but he steps up closer and slides an arm around Bilbo’s waist.  _

_ “This is my fault,” Bilbo said dully, not even registering Archemydes’ presence. _

_ “Ezra,” he sighs, trying to stop the thoughts before they pile to high. _

_ “Don’t tell me it’s not, because you know it is.” _

_ “Lock knew when he apprenticed you that you might not be able to do it. He knew that-” _

_ “HE KNEW WHAT?!” Bilbo whirled on Archemydes, using all his wiry strength to push him away. _

_ “He knew that I was a failure? That he should have left me to fucking Winter?” _

_ “Calm down! You’re smoking,” Archemydes said as plumes of illusionary smoke began to roll across the ground, Bilbo’s anger and his pain and guilt making it hard to control himself. _

_ “I should have smoked when he lost it.” He’s abruptly calm again, or rather, what he feels seems to turn inward, as he grabs his head with both hands. _

_ “I told him I would. I was- I was sure I could.” _

_ “He knew he should have chosen an apprentice that wasn’t exactly like him, Ezra. This is as much your fault as it is his.” Archemydes hears something that ends in worthy, and connects the dots. He rushed forward and wrapped his arms around the other reaper. _

_ “Never, love,” but the head on his chest was already shaking as the body straightened up. _

_ “Tell Onyx I’m retiring.” _

_ “Ezra-” _

_ “I’m done,” Bilbo cuts in. Then, he spreads his wings, pushes off the Carrock, and is gone. _

…

 

“Ezra?” Archemydes says. 

“Yeah,” Bilbo examines Archemydes’ wound very gently. 

“It’s good to have you back.”


	5. Venue

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Bilbo gets started.

It takes them almost a month to really get started. Between Archemydes’ wound and Bilbo’s need to come up with an actual plan (revenge, after all, takes a bit more than just flying around attempting to kill people).

When they do, though…

Under a cloak of invisibility and illusion, Archemydes and Bilbo jet over the waters on the three hour flight to the Isle Luna, which, is a thirty minute flight away from Lavender. They’ll set up base their. Luna, like a great deal of the uninhabited islands, is fraught with heavy foliage and magical twists on the animals everyone knows.

As they alight on the short, sandy shore, Bilbo spots a bubble of water floating through the trees, what appears to be a large koi fish circling slowly within it. Luna’s close proximity to Lavender and its magical inhabitants have done strange things to this place. The utter wildness has warned many a dragon away. It’s perfect for Bilbo. 

The two treck through heavy palms which share homes with plants that shouldn’t be here. Bilbo chooses to make the trek as a large black cat, rather than deal with magically shifting vines in human form. Archemydes soon joins him, his color sandy.

When they find a clearing in front of a cave, they scale the trees, choosing to watch for what lives in so beneficial a spot. Sure enough, a panther soon drops down from the trees and pads silently into the rock opening. Bilbo recalls that panthers don’t reside on islands, normally, but disregards it. When one’s spots are neon purple to match the left eye, while the right is a heavy gold, one does not care where they normally reside. 

Bilbo drops down from the trees and stands front and center in front of the cave. Sure enough, the panther is back, growling. The dragon kneels, forearm over high thigh, hands hanging between, waiting. The panther stalks directly up to him, and Bilbo realizes that this creature is most certainly a mesmerist.

Bilbo turns his own ability on a low register before leaning forwards and pressing a slightly upturned nose against the dark, moist one in front of him. After a moment, a pink tongue snakes out and licks along his jaw. 

The dragon rises and makes his way into the cave, aware that he will not be attacked; he has, after all, been invited. He stops. He forgot about Archemydes. The other man joins him, kneels, accepts the lick, then follows him. The tunnel down into the cave is tight and hardly big enough for a full sized Bilbo to crawl through. Of course, he’s a shapeshifter. He doesn’t need “big”. It opens out into a rather spacious place, rock walls rough hewn. There are bones in a pile, and the panther begins to shift things he’s apparently collected over to that pile.

Bilbo leaves and returns some time later with peaches, of all things, and the two eat and go to sleep side by side that night, together for warmth.

“Did you really fall in love with him?” Archemydes asks after a few minute’s silence. 

“Yes. Goodnight.”

“But why? You knew he was going to go mad someday.”

“Yeah, because love’s voluntary. Now, thank you for reminding me of that pleasant little fact. Go to sleep.” Bilbo turns into a panther and refuses to speak. The night passes in willful silence. 

…

They were… each others. No one wanted them but themselves, and it was enough. They laid together, out so late it’s morning or afternoon by the time they come back, emerging from the skin and sweat of love, from the safety of the cocoons they’d forged in each other. 

“Have you ever thought about the seer?”

“Amber?”

“Yeah.”

“No,” Aesop answered, gazing up at the stars, breathing evening out as he came down from his high. Xerxes ran a hand over Aesop’s stomach.

“Liar,” he says affectionately. Aesop shivers with the slight breeze.

“Piss yourself,” he says, the once-insult now affectionate. A soft laugh lapses into silence.

“I’d call you Lock, if I were the seer. You’re always got some secret.” Aesop considered whispering that he’d call him key, because Xerxes is the one that hears such secrets. 

“I’d call you… Victor.” he finally says, because his enemy-turned-friend-turned-lover is forever getting what he wants, regardless of the obstacles. “because you’ll rule the world some day.” Victor laughs. 

“That’s my sister.”

“It’s you,” Aesop says, absolutely certain now.

“If you say so. I’d rather spend my time with you, though.” He feels a face pressing into his stomach, a trail of kisses rising. 

A hand latches onto Aesop’s thigh as the mouth draws higher and-

…

Bilbo wakes up, still curled against Archemydes. The panther has joined them, heavy head now turned to gaze in slight confusion at the now awake mesmerist. 

Bilbo drapes an arm across the panther’s shoulders and tries to even out his breathing. He hadn’t wanted to see that. He hadn’t wanted to acknowledge what he already knew.

“Hey, love, are you okay?” Archemydes is awake now, and Bilbo can tell he’s shifted back to human form. Bilbo ignores him. He doesn’t want to tell him. Instead he settles back down, waiting. Sure enough, Archemydes is wrapping arms around him, though he doesn’t kiss down his neck like he would have, once upon a time. 

Bilbo stares off until the early hours of the morning. It’s strangely surreal to see his father’s and his mentor’s life before they became what they were. Before they really grew up. Before Lock died. 


	6. Cat

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Bilbo starts causing trouble.

It’s a monday when Bilbo makes his first move, which, apparently, is to conjure the image of a mysterious man-esque, cloaked creature standing utterly still on the water, the illusionist himself hidden. 

Within half an hour, Lavender soldiers line the same beach upon which Bilbo had once been granted freedom. They stand stock still watching, aware that the conjurer was likely more than just an illusionist, and that, at any moment, the real dragon may attack them with whatever means necessary.

Bilbo can tell by the uniforms on them that these dragons are specially trained to sense all kinds of lies. How interesting then, that he an Archemydes all but skip past them. His single image out on the waters has turned Lavender into a ghost town. 

Children of every age are indoors, especially the Cursed; can’t lose yet another one of them to Lilac, after all. The darkened doorways and shuttered windows, the crevices and the rooftops, the alleyways and the hidey holes are bristling with weaponized power. Not a single one of them notice the two travelers, who make their way through the city as two dusty brown mice (the most common color, way out here).

They have no trouble reaching the von Thorne residence. Archemydes presses the top of his mouse’s head against Bilbo’s jaw for a moment in both farewell and good luck before scurrying away; he has his own problems to deal with. 

Bilbo, for his part, takes the form of a dragonfly and wings unhindered through the air and into the crack of a window. Taking a deep breath, he begins to explore his old, haunted home. 

 

…

 

_ He has… left. Xerxes has left. Xerxes had not choice in it, not really, not once he said something. Aesop’s long-time friend, short time lover presented a week ago. He’d been so excited when he burned the grass under their feet with energy, not fire (though he’d certainly been hoping for the latter). _

_ Now Aesop- Lock, whatever the fuck his name is- is more alone in this world than he ever was before, when they were fighting and couldn’t stand each other. He sits on the beach and gazes out at the sea, wondering what happens when dragons leave. Wondering if he can ever go himself; he can’t fly very well- it’s forbidden for non-presenters and Cursed.  _

_ The plant life at his back rustles and, under the darkness of a waning crescent, is joined by the center of his thoughts, himself. He sets on Aesop’s lap a loaf of sweet bread. The other dragon tears into it; it’s gotten harder, with his mother still unresponsive, even all these years after his father’s death.  _

_ “Hey,” Xerxes says as he takes a long sigh that melts the tension away from his body in one long, deflating go.  _

_ “How was it?” How was your training? How was your heirhood? What’s it feel like to be wanted by someone other than a fellow outcast? _

_ “It was…” here, he tips his head back to gaze at their moon, which keeps disappearing behind spotty cloud cover. “Different.” he finishes, and Aesop can guess why he has such a lack of enthusiasm in the explanation. He’s talking to an all but homeless dragon he still brings food to, after all. _

_ “I’ll bet,” Aesop says, choosing not to push him. He does want to know, but it’s hard to remember that now Xerxes has everything he ever reminisced about as they lay, before and after sex, underneath cloud or leaf cover and gazed at the stars or the trees above them and considered what would happen if they presented; what would happen if they were whole dragons. _

_ Neither of them had considered what would happen if only one had presented, and the other stayed. Stagnation is, after all, the death of everything. Now Aesop is stuck in his spot, and Xerxes is moving forwards. He’s no longer at the same place they used to be.  _

_ “I miss you, Aesop. I miss us together, all day, fucking around because we’ve got no where to be,” Xerxes murmur softly into the night. “I miss seeing you smile. I miss sleeping out here because no one wants me back. I miss-” _

_ “I get it,” Aesop cuts him off; missing is all fine and good, but Aesop is still in the same spot, and he hates to be reminded that he also misses this. The only difference is, Xerxes is wanted, and Aesop is still not. Xerxes gets to eat, and Aesop does not. Xerxes is a damn prince, and Aesop is the son of an orphan and a woman who did not love her child enough to suffer through the grief and care for him after the death of his father.  _

_ Aesop hates to be reminded about what he wants but does not have; what he misses but cannot recover.  _

_ Xerxes plants a kiss on Aesop’s jaw and he tilts it for him; he craves a return to the familiar. In practiced gestures, Xerxes kisses across Aesop’s neck and face, but there seems to be no drive to move further. Aesop plants a hand on the jaw of his lover and gazes at him questioningly. _

_ “I… I saw the seer today,” he says. _

_ “Did you?” _

_ “She… she said my name’s already been chosen.” _

_ “What did you tell them?” Aesop says as he lays caged by Xerxes arms. _

_ “It told them what was true; my name is Victor.” _

_ Aesop muscles up a smile for Victor. He muscles up gratitude that his friend is getting everything he ever wanted. He muscles his way past the sudden anger that he’d been utterly right and dead wrong at the same time. _

_ After all, how much of a victor can you be if moving on means leaving the only person who really knows you behind? _

 

…

 

Bilbo jolted awake. That had been too much, too intense. He was getting tired of these games, yet his exploration of his old home had revealed not shit. 

Thorin would have made this better. Not literally, of course. The only one who could change something literally was Bilbo himself, and the dragon was working on it. And yet, his mere presence would have been much appreciated. Even if he was angry, or enraged, it would have been better to have him here than in a grave.  He still remembers, with painful clarity, the day he’d realized that he would never get over this king of his.

 

…

 

_ “So do you not like water because you can’t swim, or because you genuinely don’t like it?” _

_ “I can swim, but it’s distasteful,” the sentence had been said with an expression of constipation as Bilbo sat on the bank of a bright river, watching his people play. Thorin, next to him, smirked. _

_ “You’re like a cat.” _

_ “Am not.” this, said with an annoyed sort of finality that means the sentence isn’t really final at all, so long as Thorin runs with it.  _

_ “Are, too. But, you’re my cat,” _

_ “And you’re my idiot,” the dragon says, voice dry, as though he’s tiring of this conversation. He’s not, though. Lured by the utter lack of trees and the warmth and the sunlight, the reaper had long shed all but his trousers, and, in the spirit of resting before fighting, leaned back until he was laying on his cloak, hair all around him, sun glinting off his red skin, setting his scars to sparkling.  _

_ It doesn’t take long before the heat and the raucous sound of water sport lure him off into a gentle sleep. _


	7. Rituals

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Lock remembers when everything was okay, Bilbo goes to see his brother.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi! Getting closer to updating other stuff.

The second time he goes to Lavender, he sees Cyrus. His older brother is sitting alone on a mat in the middle of a sparse room. Bilbo watches, invisible as the brother he once fought with so fiercely takes deep, even breaths, his hair lighting on fire. It’s not like what it usually is, though. No, it’s more like a flickering candle then the burning blaze of his brother’s soul. 

Bilbo, invisible, settles down across from him. He mimics Cyrus’ loose pants and wrap-jacket but deviates from the crisscrossed legs with palms up and open. Instead, he kneels, sitting on his calves with his feet crossed, hands palm down and on high thigh. 

He watches the slow burning of his brother’s flame for so long that Cyrus realizes he’s there.

“Who are you?” He asks quietly, into empty air.

“Guess,” Bilbo says back. He can immediately see Cyrus’ stiffer posture and uneasy expression. 

“What are you doing here?”

“Who are father’s enemies?”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“Sneaky people always know what I’m talking about.” Cyrus’ nose curls up.

“I’m not like you.”

“You’re almost exactly like me. In fact, one could say that the wanderlust in my veins was a derivative of yours, brother.”

“I am not a thieving, lying fool.”

“Thieving, yes. Lying? Definitely. Fool, though? How?”

“You left. You can’t just come back and start stalking. I know why you’re here, Ezra. But no one needs you. No one wants you. The von Thornes don’t care about you. Stop wasting your time, take what you should never have gotten and leave. Don’t act a fool and try and come back.” He sounds tired on that last sentence. Bilbo barks a laugh.

“You think I’m trying to come back? I have been drawn back. You’re the fool, here. You, who waits for whatever is happening here to boil over. So tell me what I came to find. Who is after the von Thornes?” Cyrus gives him a long, angry look.

“Like I’d sell out my own to a Cursed,” he hisses, and Bilbo sees what Cyrus has always seen; he may be the only one of the von Thornes who has a chance of making it out of whatever this is, but he is still just an outcaste.

“Then I will find out myself, brother.” Then he is gone, like so little wind.

 

…

 

Lock tore at his hair in anger and frustration. WHY!? Why did it always have to be him who got the shaft end of the bargain? Why did they always have to take everything? Who do they think they are to do such a thing? Why… why did Victor have to give in to them?

Tears leaked out of his proud red eyes as Lock collapsed on the loamy ground of the leafy forest. He just wanted Victor back. He didn’t want to be alone and he didn’t want to be like this. This was only great when he was here. Now it was nothing. Just like him. Fuck what the seer said about him mattering. He lost his purpose to Elias von Thorne and the rest of those pricks.

He pulled his knees up to his eyes and buried the caps in the soft, squishy globes. If he wondered how hard he’d have to press to blind himself. He remembered when Victor would be here for this. He remembered when Victor wasn’t the cause of this. He remembered when he could be secure in the knowledge of his best friend’s love. 

Now his best friend didn’t care anymore and Lock’s stuck here in this retched dark. He’d give anything to be with him. The rest of them could ignore him for the rest of his life; it didn’t matter, so long as he had Victor to love him. 

But Victor loved belonging more than he ever loved anything else, and Lock should have known. He should have-

His eyes widened as he stared at the vision before him. He didn’t just imagine Victor’s form sitting opposite of him, being there like he should be. He actually created the image. 

Just like that, his concentration snapped and the image disappeared. The image disappears and a cold sweat cools previously boiling hot skin. Oh, god, he’s going to die for real, now. They’re going to cage him. They’re going to stone him, if he makes them mad enough. They’re never going to let him near the redeemed and esteemed Victor von Thorne, now.

He stood up and turned around in a quick circle. No one saw. No one was here. No one witnessed his sin. He could do this, then. He could… hide. He did it all the time. All he had to was figure out what triggers his abilities and not do that thing. As for Victor… well, he didn’t care anymore, did he?

If he was going to put those who would not have him above Lock, then Lock would not offer him what those same people would hate him for. 

No, he would keep this to himself. He would… he would train. He would teach himself to be… be special. To be unique. To matter. 

He took a calming breath and sat back down and gazed at the spot where Victor was before. He thought about how amazing it’d felt to be with him, how they’d been naked and playing in the waves, and how no one would help if they drowned, but it was still great because it had been just the two of them.

There was hardly any of that, anymore, but maybe he could have that again for a while. He thought some more and remembered how, afterwards, they’d been freezing cold and had sat with knees under chins.

“Now, we can begin the ritual,” Victor said, utterly solemn. This, of course, was why they’d been out in the freezing ass surf anyways. The ritual.

Victor reached out a hand and interlocked it with Locks opposite. They held tightly to each other, they shaking threatening to dislodge their grip. 

“What binds us, Lock?”

“Loyalty,” Lock breathed. Victor gave him a little smile.

“Love,” he answered. Lock’s turn.

“Beauty,”

“And strength.”

“To the things we have,”

“And the things we will have,”

“Regardless of ability,”

“Popularity,”

“Or acceptance.” Lock finishes, and they hold hands like that before they’re falling together to get warm and to love as the forest cradles their words and their promises and their dreams all night long until they can once again take them up like a shared mantle in the morning.

Of course, then Victor had presented, and he had no time for silly little rituals done when everything was bright in their darkness.


	8. One of the Later Nails

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Bilbo goes a-hunting. Lock gets a hard truth.

In the end, it’s easy for Bilbo to figure out where to start. After all, who had the most reason to come after the von Thornes? Silent and unnoticed, Bilbo walked among the crowded market, past the loud hawking of buyers and merchants and the screaming, wild, unpresented children, sometimes tagged after by sometimes older, presented children, granted a break from their studies. Bilbo blinks. He remembers playing in the fountain. 

  
  


The sunlight, bright and hot on the stones that make up the market’s ground and glinting off the fountain’s water in the middle. The youngest of the children play and splash around with the koi fish and try to catch the fat gold, white, and mottled creatures. Bilbo knows that there are other, deeper fountains with no koi, since older children will be able to catch and play with the fish, rather than reach and miss with their little baby hands. 

He smiles a bit as he sees the them. How happy they are. Bilbo slips past them, careful to avoid touching any of the handful of groups and lone people striding about. The sun, bright and hot on this summer day, beats against Bilbo’s invisible back and warms him. He stops himself from sighing. It’s been quite sometime since he sat and enjoyed sunlight; too stressed and guarded. 

He winds through the labyrinth on the other side of the minor square he just passed through until he finds the grand house of Chrysanthemum du Tron. He shifts down into a small mouse and gets into the house through a window. It takes him more than an hour of searching to find what looks like Chrysanthemum’s bedroom, just based off of the furnishings. He hides and waits, carefully staying still to conserve energy; shapeshifting is not limitless, and while his stamina is applaudable, a form this small takes more to maintain.

The curtains over the door swish aside, and a small, lithe dragon strides in, feet bare below her loose pants, wide leather belt, and bivolo jacket. She’s sweating, and lacking her over robe, so Bilbo’s guessing that she was practicing. She sits on the edge of her bed and runs small hands through short spiky hair. The tips briefly turn to flames as she touches them. Bilbo considers his options. He could wait for her to do something concerning him, but that would take too long. The other option is to interrogate her. 

He looks at the small roll, cheese wedge, and fruit on a plate in her hand and guesses that this is her dinner, meaning that no one will bother her until after she’s eaten; he knows from both his and, later, Lock’s observations that no one speaks with the head of a House if they choose to take their dinner elsewhere.

Bilbo darts out from his place between two trunks. The whole of Chrysanthemum’s head lights up as Bilbo shifts up into the tall, darkly clad form he normally wanders about in.

“Did you miss me, Chrysanthemum?” he asks as the other dragon attempts to throw fire at him. In a blink, he presses forward and, eyes glowing and tumbling in their confines, says low, mesmerising words.

“Easy, love. Don’t fight me. Just listen.” Chrysanthemum’s burning, intelligent eyes go dull as she lowers her hand, loosing all flame.

“Good. Now, who wants me dead?” Her mouth opens and closes, then opens again. 

“Nnn… the seer’s… enemy.” Oh, god. The seer could be a rabbit hole to navigate.

“What do you know about the seer’s enemy?”

“Nothing… too slippery. Tried to kill him, once… madness.”

“What madness?” the benefits of mesmerizing your target is that they also loose control of their emotions. Chrysanthemum’s face twists into fear and worry.

“Madness… that haunts.” Her small hands grip each other and twist around each other. For whatever reason, Bilbo feels pity. He doesn’t attempt to get anymore out of her- just takes her face in his hands.

“Forget that I was ever here. Forget what I asked of you. Forget what you said.” Then he’s gone, like so much dust. When he manages to gain the sunlight once more, the sun has actually already set, and it’s cold. Quickly, he takes a bird’s form and flies back to the island he is taking refuge on to sleep a fitful, tired sleep.

 

…

 

_ “Oh, Aesop…” Victor said, watching in sadness and apprehension and- perhaps the most telling of all- fear. Victor had been sucked in by their words. _

_ “Victor!” Lock responds, turning to look at him, his illusion disappearing with his concentration. _

_ “Oh, Aesop, I’m so sorry,” said the dragon. Lock saw the pity there, and he was angered by it. _

_ “My name is Lock,” here, the dragon raised a clawed hand, “and tell no one.” _

_ “But, I have to. Your… your Cursed,” said he, half begging, half pleading. _

_ “No, you don’t. It will be just like it has been. I stay out here, alone and not a danger to anyone, and you be king. It can be our secret, right, Victor?” Lock asked, hopeful and fearful.  _

_ “A… Lock…” Lock started to shake his head before stalking closer. _

_ “Let me make sure I have this right. I am the only friend that has ever loved you for you and you alone- not your abilities, and not your blood- and you’re thinking of ratting on me because I can create illusions? Because I’m what they hate?” Lock could tell that he could neither say yes nor no.  _

_ “It’s not just that…” he finally said. _

_ “No, it is that. I’ve put up with your need to belong. I put up with it when you left me here by myself all day, every day. I put up with it when you start talking about what your family did and how they’re starting to accept you, even though I’ll never have any of that. I realize that a lot of what is happening isn’t your fault, but you owe me this. _

_ “Say. Nothing. You, of all people, will not be the one to ruin me.” Victor met his eyes for a moment, guilt and indecision warring for a few moments. Lock held it steadily for a few moments until Victor nodded. _

_ “Ok,” he said, dropping his gaze. Lock stepped forwards for a kiss, but Victor stepped back. _

_ “Not… interfering is one thing, but…” he couldn’t say the rest of it.” Lock wheels on one heel and strides off into the forest. He couldn’t deal, at the moment. He could only prepare himself, because things would get much harder in not so long. _

_ It was one of the final nails in their coffin. _


	9. Incubi

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Bilbo goes to see the seer, and Lock gets a visitor, way back when.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you to everyone who's stuck with it so far.

The island that serves as Lavender’s center is quite large, with nearly a quarter of it raised, with vibrant green plant life growing over a massive portion of it, and with jagged, rough rock popping up hear and there. At the peak of this large hill is a stone pavilion with four support columns in each corner. The entire structure is pale marble.

The only walls of any kind are gauzy, silk curtains of lavender. Objects of every kind hang from the ceiling- a fact easy to see as only three sides of the pavilion are covered. Today, in the bright sunlight of the mid-autumn day, a crisp breeze blows across the top of the island, rippling the gauze curtains. Oddly enough, they don’t seem to  blow too far from their resting position.

Bilbo, in the form of a brown mouse, crests the lip of the hill and shifts up into his form under a cloak of invisibility. He looks around carefully, aware that it’s almost impossible to sneak up on this particular seer and skittish because of it. 

“Stop hiding, child. They can’t see you up here,” a disembodied voice points out. As much as Bilbo would like to listen to the voice and drop his invisibility, he’s not about to. He’s not that comfortable with the seer. Bilbo strides over the landscape and stops at the uncurtained wall, waiting. 

“Come in.” In a smooth, fluid motion, he mounts the thick floor and sinks down onto a woven mat, hands on thighs, head bowed slightly. He hasn’t seen this woman in years, but it’s easy to slip back into the respectful habits he’d picked up as a child- long before the seer ever became reality- at the knee of his father.

“What have you been up to?”

“Everything. Necromancing, reaping, avenging, that sort of thing,” he said quietly. He decided before he got here that truth would be best. 

“Hmm, it shows,” the seer says before appearing as if by magic with a tray of tea in her hand. She sinks down onto the mat in front of him and offers a hot earthen cup. Bilbo takes it and relishes the heat as it burns his hands just the slightest bit more than is comfortable. It’s nice, and feels even better as the first bit of liquid sharply heats his mouth and slides down his throat, sweet enough to die for. 

“Thank you, ma’am.”

“What brings you here?” the seer says with a nod of acceptance.

“Who haunts my family?”

“How do you know they’re being haunted?”

“Whoever it is showed their hand some months ago.”

“And you think I know.”

“You knew what I’ve been up to before I opened my mouth. You knew I was here before I made a sound.”

“Is that so?”

“You had tea ready. It is so.” For a moment, the brown, round face of his companion is void of movement, with the exception of the eyes, which bore into Bilbo’s for a moment or two before flicking over the rest of him, then back to his face. 

Then the face moves, muscles shifting, wrinkles deepening, silver hair moving just the slightest bit with the chuckle that accompanies the radiant, captivating smile.

“You sly thing! Yes, I know who haunts your family.”

“Who?”

“There are other seers out there, Bilbo, and one of them is afraid- very afraid- of the von Thornes, especially if the family should ever amass and welcome back their lost member.” the seer is quiet for a moment before speaking again.

“I don’t know the name- it isn’t always something I see- but I can tell you that the creature in question is not on Lavender at the moment. He or she is in Lilac.” Bilbo becomes deathly still. Lilac? Did it have to be Lilac? It couldn’t have been some recluse gone off the deep end with loneliness or strain, like Bilbo himself once did and his mentor before him?

“Where on Lavender?”

“I don’t know, but you might just be able to smell the fear, should you ever be alone with that person.” Bilbo nodded.

“Thank you, ma’am.”

“Do you know my name?” Amber says suddenly, as if just recalling that she meant to bring this up.

“N… no.”

“It Amber, and one of your names is Merci, so remember that when you go avenging, yeah?” Another nod, another drink.

“Yeah.” Bilbo rises and bids the s-Amber goodbye before disappearing. He has a meddler to find. 

 

…

 

_ Lock curled up in his own bed. He rarely spent any time here, with the Fade taking his mum so badly that they’d moved her in with relatives, and there never being food here. It was old and in disuse and misrepair, but he felt the need to lay here and remember when his daddy wasn’t dead and his mother wasn’t dying and he still had so much love poured onto him and so much potential thrummed through his veins. Well. The potential manifested, alright, but not in the way he wanted it to.  _

_ In a fit of temper, he gouged his sharp nails into the bed before rising off of it and striding through the empty, abandoned house. He hated this… miserable existence.  _

_ “Lock?!” He heard echo through the hallways from the front door. How odd, what does Victor want, that he’d bother seeking Lock out? _

_ “Lock, I figured it out!” His stomach lurched with the infusion of a fresh hope over the carcass of long dead ones. _

_ “Figured what out?” _

_ “Our problem! Listen, we can still be together!” _

_ “Aye?” he said, now not trusting this plan. He’s too Disgusting with a capital D to ever deserve the crown prince of the damn Isles. _

_ “Aye. All you have to do is let me “take” you in, and they’ll be mad, and they’ll rage, and they’ll talk, and I’ll suggest that we’d make a good pair. Father- father said that any time a Cursed and a Blessed have children, then there won’t be another Cursed through at least their great grandchildren. It could work,” Victor said. _

_ For Lock’s part, he was stunned. He couldn’t move as he thought about this idea… this possibility of still being with Victor- his strong, lovely Victor- without the disapproval of the entire island. Without the witch hunts. Without the suppression so many Cursed go through, since, with their marriage, Lock would be part of the damn Patriarch’s family. He’d be untouchable in many respects. _

_ Untouchable and suppressed, that is, which is the thought that shook him back to the reality of the situation, that awakened him to the grip of large hands, rough from handling a broadsword, around his arms. Lock tensed, but Victor didn’t seem to notice. He was too elated. _

_ “We can make this work, Lock.” _

_ “Can we?” _

_ “Yeah, love,” for the first time in weeks, Victor pressed a kiss to Lock’s mouth. The dragon jerked. He hadn’t been expecting it. _

_ “I need to think.” _

_ “...Oh. Okay,” Victor let him go, and Lock remembered how cold it is. _

_ “I’ll see you when I can, yeah?” _

_ “Yeah.” _

_ Victor left him after a few moments of awkward standing, and, when Lock couldn’t stand the old house anymore, the second dragon left to, making his way through narrow and dusty alleyways to the edge of the city, into the jungle, and out onto the beach. Here, he sank down on cold sand. High tide had wet the sand just before him, and he stared at the line marking where it had not been able to gain more ground. _

_ Should he? Should he try it? _

_ Stupid. It wouldn’t be a “try”. It would be a “try”. It would be a damn permanent change. _

_ “Hmm, you Lavender ilk don’t wander far from each other,” a voice mused in the dark. Lock jumped up, hands bared, teeth out, ready for a fight. _

_ “Peace, young one. I don’t intend to hurt you, I just want to talk,” said the voice. It was smooth and deep like dark intentions and thick honey. Behind him, there’s a rustle, and Lock turns to see a dark figure. _

_ “Who are you?” _

_ “No one, but you can call me Onyx.” He certainly had the skin to match, Lock observed distantly as he sought to keep distance between them. He was strange, with robes that flowed to his feet and eyes so piercing it was hard to look away. _

_ “What do you want?” _

_ “To make a proposition,” he paused, watching with a serious expression until Lock gave a tiny jerk of his head. _

_ “I know what you can do, Illusionist. I know what you have to choose between. So I’ll give you a third choice. You can come with me, and I can teach you everything they never showed you, give you everything that should have been yours by right of your life. I’ll show you where the real ocean’s at, and I’ll show you where the real evil lives.” _

_ “Why?” Lock said after moments of extended silence. _

_ “Because I can. Think about it, yeah? I’ll be around for a while.” Then Lock woke up, and he realized that he had fallen asleep on his old bed, face in the musty pillow, drool spilling from one corner of his mouth. Dawn was about to rise in earnest, sky getting incrementally lighter the longer he laid there. _

_ And lay he did, absorbing the fact that he’d just had a conversation with a real live incubus.  _


	10. Mandragora

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Bilbo goes to see Mandragora and, for the first time, so does Lock.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 2.5 days of school left, guys. Wish me luck!

Bilbo blew into Lilac like he blows into a man’s town on the hunt for a necromancer: quiet, and unnoticed. He walked along the roofs, enjoying the view. It’ll probably be the last time he has time for such things. It also has the added advantage of enabling him to see the great, domed building he’s aiming for.

It is times like these that he’s grateful that invisibility is an extension of his illusionism. He can hear the chatter of all the Cursed that live in Lilac. In a way, it makes him happy; some of these people were born here. Others had the courage and gumption needed to escape. They’ve all found a slice of peace.

It’s a good thing to remember as he turns his attention back to the destination and finds himself poking his head through an open window (an odd thing to have, on an island with a large population of dragons that can turn invisible) and into a small library. When he sees no one, he shrinks down into a little bird and flutters out into the room, still invisible.

With a practiced air, he examines the library. A few books have been taken from strong stone shelves and left out in the open on matching tables, all of which have leathery cloth covering them, probably to protect the book covers from grating against the rough surfaces. The tablecloths, Bilbo notices, are shiny in places, like they’ve been well worn.

Candles, most of which are a quarter used, wait to be lit. The place is mostly neat, but there’s too many things out of place for the library to be truly unused. He moves towards the door, waiting. As soon as it opens, he flits through it, over the head of the smaller child coming into the room.

He makes his way through the halls and the corridors, making his way to the section of the building he’d gotten accustomed to during his stay there. From the familiar hallways, he makes his way to the place Mandragora saw him both all those years ago and recently.

He waits, again, for the door to open. It doesn’t take long, as what Bilbo’s guessing is a noble of some sort exits the room. He seems upset long, wildly curly hair swishing back and forth as he walks quickly away. Bilbo slips in above his head once more.

Mandragora’s wild white hair has been pulled back into a sleek bun, sitting at the nape of her neck, the silver complemented by a large red amaryllis. Her black robe, heavy against the pervading chill that seems to be everywhere as of late, is tied tightly around her. Even though she’s gotten on in her years, she still looks good.

He appears in front of her, still ten feet away. Then, he promptly disappears as Mandragora sends a small clay cup flying where his head was at a moment ago.

“I know you don’t like me, but I haven’t even done anything yet,” he says from a different point in the wide, high-ceilinged room Mandragora so often resides in. He moves again, in case she still doesn’t know who it is, but nothing else goes flying.

“Thought you were off to avenge. Or revenge. Or something,” it occurs to Bilbo that Mandragora may have just made the most honest statement he’s ever heard from her.

“I am. The trail, though, has led me here to your humble abode.” For some time, Bilbo had found some measure of discomfort in the fact that for a woman who had nearly died after outliving her first husband and mothering two strong fire-breathing children, Mandragora seemed oddly made for a seat of power. Then again, the female dragon had once been a part of the di Con line, so she must have picked up some idea of how to behave. According to Lock, she had been a Cursed more worse off than most, so it would make sense for her to like this quiet, vast space she’s made for herself.

“On what grounds?”

“My grounds,” he says, more smugly than he ought to. Mandragora rolls her dark eyes.

“What do you want me to do?”

“How many seers live in Lilac?”

“Close to a hundred, by the last count.”

“How often and accurate are your counts?”

“We… don’t usually count. As you know, Lavender does yearly counts. We try not to copy unnecessary behaviors like that too much, though we do monitor how many are in any military positions, and most of them volunteer information  for their families. Additionally, half of our all-civilian families volunteer information ahead of time, since most of them need help managing any anomalistic presentations, of which seers are one of the most difficult. All in all, a hundred seers is fairly accurate,” she concludes. She falls quiet, waiting.

“I don’t suppose you have the names of the seers that you probably have,” Bilbo remarks drily.

“I have a list of those we know exist. We have a record keeper. He or one of his people should know what you’re looking for.” Bilbo nods a few times, skimming his hand around the rim of the bowl Mandragora had eaten out of earlier. There’s a second set of dishes here. Briefly, he wonders who she’d had for dinner.

“Sounds good.”

…

_The incubus was in his head the next time he went to sleep. He held out his hand as he stood at the tideline on the dream beach. Lock hesitates before he takes it._

_“Where are we going?”_

_“Where the ocean’s at.” That doesn’t really mean much, since they’re standing on the tideline. But he remembers that Onyx had said something about the “real” ocean, and the “real evil”, so he shrugs and extends his own hand._

_Big, calloused fingers close around his thinner digits, and then they’re gone, up away into the sky. Over the fairly calm, dark waters shone with stars’ reflections as they travelled over the dreamscape that Onyx had apparently travelled in real life._

_Sooner than it should be, they came upon a great island, somewhat larger than Lavender, though not my much. ­They landed just inside a great stone wall. Onyx, still keeping hold of Lock’s hand, led him through a maze of alleyways created by houses, small businesses and squares. It’s reminiscent of Lavender, and thoroughly off-putting, since he doesn’t know where he’s going here, and he has Lavender City memorized._

_Onyx is sure of his steps, though, and they move silently towards the center. The winding lower streets of this strange place gradually get wider as the ground evens out underneath their feet. Eventually, they come to a group­­ of larger buildings. Lock cranes his head back to see the extent to which the square, stone structures rise. Onyx doesn’t even look up as he leads Lock into once again narrowing streets and to what is perhaps the largest building of them all._

_Onyx opens the great double dream doors, though why they wouldn’t be locked is a mystery, and ushers Lock into a wide corridor, which has many doors leading off of it, along with a handful of hallways. The pair head down to the end of the hall and turn left and, at the end of this bisecting hall, left again. In the middle of this last place, Onyx opens an oddly humble looking door. Within the new door is a large chamber._

_Large shelves stretch from the floor to the ceiling, filled with books. Tables are strewn about the place in a haphazard way, with different items on each. About half of them have a combination of books and paper and quill pens and inkpots, while others have exclusively one or the other. Two have a deck of cards, distributed in a way that says some sort of game was interrupted not a single moment ago. One has dice that give off the same air. One table, the farthest back, has a bowl, a plate with cheese and an apple, a cup, and a small journal. The dishes are earthenware._

_All the tables form the outer wave of furniture. The inner wave of furniture is made up of comfortable couches and chairs, whereas the ones at the table are straight backed, wooden with only cursory padding on it. The apex­­ of this apparent oval (the room is rectangular) is the circle of empty space­­ that Lock and Onyx have come to stand in._

_“Where are we?”_

_“The personal library of Mandragora, matron of the Lilac Isles, home to a vast majority of the Cursed that have gone missing over the years. She holds court here, as you can see,” Onyx says with a gesture at the couches and chairs, “and a lot of people come to dwell here.” Lock glances at the tables._

_“Why are we here?”_

_“Thought you might want to see where those who will accept you are.” Just then, the door opens again and admits a single, tall dragon, skin darkish in color, but not as dark as the shiny, mahogany hair that runs down around her shoulders and upper back. Large, almond shaped eyes and a matching mouth and chin are offset by a high, strong forehead, dark eyebrows, and a hooked nose._

_“Is that…”_

_“Mandragora.” The woman, wearing loose pants, a sash about the waist, and a bivolo jacket moves throughout the room, calmly putting things away, sometimes pumping powerful mahogany wings to get up to higher shelves. Lock glances at Onyx and notices the oddly riveted way Onyx watches the woman, whose wrinkles have begun to show._

_“Are you and her involved?” He’d never been good at being gentle. Onyx smiles._

_“Very perceptive of you, and we were, once upon a time.”_

_“But you aren’t now?”_

_“I don’t reside in Lilac. In fact, I don’t even reside in the archipelago, most of the time.”_

_“But you’d show me all this anyways.”_

_“An informed decision is not commonly changed.” Lock nods and follows Onyx as the dark dragon leads him deeper into the library._


	11. Make Your Choice

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Bilbo goes to Lilac. Lock goes to Erebor and Mirkwood. Victor goes to an extreme.

The good thing about having a record is that it’s easy to narrow down the target. For instance, of the hundred or so seers, twelve of them are children, and another seventy five of them do not have skills developed enough to continuously haunt Bilbo like this one does, or so the record keeper, Konrad, says.

Bilbo had given him a long and hard once over. Konrad, after all, is not his friend. He doesn’t raise flags, though, so Bilbo hides his mistrust. Now, he’s sitting at a table in the large library, chair turned so that he faces the room; it’s harder to sneak up on someone like that.

“What about this one?” Mandragora tilts her head. 

“Maybe.” He sets the paper aside. The name, written with quill pen in runes, reads Drop, former Lavender resident, son of a military vet. He thinks he met that vet. It wouldn’t surprise him if he had “accidentally” left his maps out and “assumed” that no son of his would be Cursed. The dragon had nearly died escaping regardless, but he had an extraordinary amount of skill for a nine year old dragon.

It wouldn’t surprise Bilbo if he’d take action against a wandering dead man. After all, this is Drop’s peace. What remains to be seen is whether or not the long-time seer is actually strong enough. After all, Onyx was Lock’s mentor, and Lock was Bilbo’s. The three of them, as well as Archemydes, have and had a mind like a steel traps. 

Speaking of Archemydes, the dragon is slinking around Lilac and Lavender both, keeping watch where Bilbo is not. He imagines the man might report back soon, given that there’s no chance for Bilbo to learn of any plots from Lavender, being that he’s long gone. If the problem is, in part, in his hometown, he’ll know about it.

“That’s enough for today,” Bilbo says, rising with his three files out of the three dozen he and Mandragora had looked at. 

“Aye.”

“Bilbo?” Mandragora says, voice a little graver than it’s been all day and evening. Bilbo turns back to the telekinetic dragon and waits.

“Don’t let it get too far.” Bilbo nods. Mandragora is the sovereign of a nation of cutthroat killers and maimers protecting what matters most to them: each other. If one of them turns on another cursed then, whether that Cursed is a Lilac citizen or not, they are left to the will of the one they’ve turned on. Mandragora is not asking Bilbo to spare whoever it is. She’s asking for him to make it quick; to not drag it out. It’s a mercy in and of itself.

He resolves to do so.

 

…

 

_ The things Onyx had shown Lock was almost as drawing as the chance of escape from his shitty reality. Victor could hardly be in the same place with him without begging Lock to turn himself in. So the dragon has taken to avoiding the crown prince. On top of that, his one time friend and lover found discomfort in bringing him food after he learned of the truth about Lock; after all, why feed a leech? _

_ Lock looked up at the trees around him. At the height of summer, soursop hang heavy this far into the forest. He pulls one down and retrieved the blade he always had with him and cuts smoothly into the fruit. It was his dinner.  _

_ The Incubus’s visits always left him tired, so he had no problems eating before evening and sleeping soon after. Quickly and efficiently, he gorges himself on the fruit; he hasn’t had anything since yesterday. When he’s done, he turned invisible and trekked deeper into the forest, nearer to the seer.  _

_ It took him maybe an hour to find his destination: an uninhabited cave he located some time earlier, after his first illusion. After all, Victor knew about his last one. Speaking of knowledge. The dragon seemed to be content in waiting for Lock to decide on whether or not he would out himself. Still. Victor is not to be trusted, if years of being outcast can be offset by a few months of this false “belonging”. He could have been just as ignored had he wound up a weak dragon, after all.  _

_ Maybe that would have been best, really. Maybe those bursts of energy that Victor had shot out of his hands at the sand on the beach would have been better off as weak sputters instead of ones that had advanced with force strong enough and hot enough to turn its target into a spray of glass suspended in the air like a moment frozen in time. Maybe they could have avoided this all together.  _

_ Then again, this thing that Lock had found would have been so easy. He had, through the work of odd jobs he’d done and been payed for (or he had stolen his payment, had it not been forthcoming) saved enough to buy himself bedding. It is under this heavy fabric envelope that he slid, pillowing his head on arm and second cloth bundle, fruit carcass beside him (he would need to bury it later), and drifted immediately into an almost unnaturally deep sleep. _

_ He opened his eyes to find himself standing next to the glass spray Victor had created, facing the ocean. He laid his hand along it. How odd that the dreams casted by his friend would be so real as to allow him to feel the cold underneath his hot hand. _

_ “Lock.” His head snapped up to see Onyx stepping towards him. No matter how watchful he was, the other dragon had no problems sneaking up on him. This is a dream, though. What did he expect? _

_ “Onyx,” he answered. The dragon held out a large hand, and Lock’s slipped smoothly into it. They’ve done this before, after all. The lifted into the air together, and, after almost an entire minute of hurtling through the sky, arrive at what is most definitely not an island. _

_ “Where are we?” _

_ “Where the evil’s at.” the travelled over a land mass bigger than anything Lock had ever seen. They passed series of hills with small creatures moving across them. _

_ “What are they?”  _

_ “Dwarves, inhabitants of this area.” _

_ “Are they like us?” _

_ “In what way?” Onyx said as they flew over the dwarves. _

_ “Do they have… abilities?” Onyx smiled. _

_ “They are the best stonemasons and metal craftsmen in all of this world. It’s said their spirit alone is their ability.” _

_ “Are there more?” Lock asked, now overflowing questions. He wanted so see them up close. He wanted to see this masonry that was so highly thought of by even this dark master next to him, holding his hand to keep him from getting lost in the dream. _

_ “Yes, but not here. We’ve just passed the Iron Hills. Ahead is Erebor, ruled by the dwarven Longbeard clan.” _

_ “You don’t sound happy.” _

_ “The clan is cursed, with many of it’s descendants succumbing to a madness brought on by the great riches oft possessed by them. That kind of madness attracts evil.” _

_ “Aye?” _

_ “Aye.” Erebor, as it turned out, was a great and majestic thing, rising strong and alone in the distance. They reached it in a matter of seconds. Throughout the dreams Onyx created, Lock had learned to let go of certain realities that ceased to exist in dreams. Things like “if you don’t have the ability, you can’t walk through walls”. They phase through it easily. _

_ Now that they were much closer, Lock could see that dwarves are in fact, quite short. He giggles. Who’d have thought that the best metal workers and smithies in the world were only hip high? His laugh felt odd in his throat. He hadn’t done that in a long time. The second thing was the sheer amount of hair and objects about these dwarves. _

_ Beards and hair fell braided to the waist or knees, in several cases. Long tunics, often accentuated with armor, or visa versa, hid and bulked out the shape of many of them. Lock could see piercings, too- gleaming gems and metal all in a row over the arch and down the wide curve of their overly large ears and grinned from lips and noses and eyebrows. Tattoos curled around hands and skulls. Ribbons accentuated mildly curling hair and gems sat cushioned around it or stood out against chest or curled around fingers and wrists. Heavy iron-tipped boots with different intricate designs covered nearly every bit of skin below the knee and weapons and tools hung from every belt, with buckles and leather differing in their own designs. _

_ They were well fed, with some of them fat, but most of them muscular and bulky. He grins. It’s not uncommon to just wear a sash and flowing cotton pants that only fall to high shin on even mildly warm days in Lavender. He liked these creatures. He hasn’t even talked to them, but he wished to. It seems, though, as if he would have a very specific challenge for doing this. _

_ “What are they speaking?” _

_ “Khuzdul. A very ancient, secret dwarven language.” _

_ “It sounds like they’re cursing constantly.” _

_ “They are. About every third to every tenth word, depending on the dwarf.” Onyx said. They floated unobtrusively through the halls, phased through doors and walls without ever being seen or noticed, until they found themselves floating above narrow walkway. _

_ At the end of the walkway was a great dwarf, outfit more plate armor than cloth, sitting on the throne. His black beard was sprinkled through with blue stones that shone softly and attractively in the light. His hair was drawn back into a braid that ran down his head before swinging over his shoulder to drape down to touch the great stone chair he was sitting in. A runic khuzdul character was repeated across his outfit. It hemmed the bottom of his tunic, was emblazoned against both the shoulder and chest plates, sat proudly in the middle of a fat ring on the middle finger on the left hand, gleamed among the geometric designs on the iron toes of his boots, and was pressed into the top of the sheath and the pommel of a large broadsword. The main colors of the outfit seemed to be the silver and black of the armor and the blue and black of the cloth, and the silver and blue of the large fur coat surrounded him. _

_ The oddest thing about the dwarf was the thing on his head. It was silver and black, and shone just vaguely bronze where it caught the light of torches that seemed to throw light far farther than anything Lock had seen. It was jagged, creating a fearsome appearance the way it seemed capable of killing the wearer. It, too, had the rune. Lock pointed to it and turned to Onyx. He opened his mouth, but the other dragon had already guessed. _

_ “That a crown, and that is Dain I, brother of Fror, son of Nain II, son of Thorin I, current King Under the Mountain. He’s yet to succumb to madness, but I don’t doubt that it will happen.” _

_ “Why?” _

_ “His love of gold is unrivaled, just like his father.” _

_ “What about his grandfather?” _

_ “He was a wanderer; Thorin I was no king; never wanted to be. He preferred to travel, so his brother did the ruling, and he often handled the foreign relations. He had a gift for it, that one.” _

_ “Have you spoken to them?” _

_ “Yes, and, in time, I’ll teach you.” A sharp, eager nod provoked a smile from Onyx. Would you like to see the elves tonight? You’ll wind up sleeping until nearly early evening if we do.” What did he have to wake up for? _

_ “Yes.” Onyx takes his hand again, and they found themselves standing in arching, airy halls bustling with gauzy, tall people with longer, higher features than that of the rugged beauty of the dwarves, with their sharp or fat noses and thick fingers. Their hair, though just as long, was almost entirely straight, and the designs in them were simpler. For the most part, they seemed to wear less fur and more smooth cloth, the garments long and flowing. Even their armor gave the appearance of being light and airy. There were less weapons, but of what Lock could see, there seemed to be more spears and bows and arrows than broadswords and hammers. _

_ “The Elves of Greenwood, and here-” they disappear and reappear again in a large room with another throne. This one was elevated, and the blonde, majestic creature sitting on it had a crown oddly reminiscent of the one Nain had, accept this one was less voluminous and made out of… sticks? _

_ “Why sticks?” _

_ “The sticks are still alive. That is Thranduil, elvhenking of the Greenwood.” _

_ “Who’s his father?”  _

_ “I’ve never met him, but he’s called Oropher; elves live forever, you know. Thranduil’s been alive for hundreds of years longer than I have or my mentor has or my mentor’s mentor has.” Lock nods and opens his mouth. Before he could voice the question, he felt thick hands against his cheeks. _

_ “Time to go,” he wakes up to the voice of Victor. _

_ “Aesop? Aesop! I need to talk to you.” For a moment, Lock believed him. Then he realized that Aesop isn’t his name anymore. Something cold and hot at the same time curled sickeningly in his gut. It seems Victor had made the choice for him, after all. _


	12. Katedraal

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Bilbo finds the seer, Lock finds a nasty surprise.

The rookery is a term for the housing of a rook, which looks like a crow (or Raven). It’s also a tight collection of housing, specifically in a slum. Neither of these definitions seem to apply to what he’s found. Behind him, on a long, one armed sofa, a male dragon is caught in Bilbo’s enchanted sleep. He’ll die, probably, by the end of the night, but not before Bilbo has satisfied his curiosity.

The seer, it seems, is thrice Cursed. Once to see the future. Twice to mesmerize, and the third time to scry and speak through mirrors. He glances behind him. It wouldn’t surprise him if the man- Amadeus- had some kind of resistance to Bilbo’s mesmerism, and so wake prematurely.

He looks again at a six by four inch book. The thing is bound red leather, but it’s a Black Book, through and through. He remembers the first time he ever saw one of these things.

 

…

 

_ He was young enough to still be on fire with no hint of pain, excited to be something beyond himself. He was a reaper, teetering on the edge of full fledged and scared to step off of it. He was not far from the beginning of the end. Bilbo was wandering around the residence of Maximus Lye, Necromancer stationed in Erebor, late as of two minutes ago.  _

_ He should be gone, but he had something else that he needed to find, though he didn’t know what. He could taste it in his mind. He glanced at the chest of drawers at the foot of the bed. There, maybe. The entire place stank of black magic, but it seemed oddly concentrated and slightly removed in the case of the chest. He glanced around, stepped back over to the corpse of the dwarf on the bed and slid his hand along a quickly cooling neck, uncovering a silver flat link chain, on the end of which is an ornate, old key. It’s this that opened the chest, and only his ability to handle influxes of black magic that kept him conscious and guarded.  _

_ He flipped up the lid of the chest and, guided more strongly now, reached down on to the bottom the chest and, at the upper right hand corner, uncovered a small journal only half the size of his hand. He pulled it open and looked in it. The writing was a mishmash of languages, Khuzdul, Westron, Sindarin, and his own native, runic Lavin were joined in a mishmash of horribly grammar-ed… sentences? They didn’t seem to make any sense, if they were, indeed sentences. _

 

…

 

He had burned that book in a pan with a heavy iron lid, Lock holding it down tight against the fire. Now he was holding another Black Book, said to curse the souls of any recorded within it. He takes a deep breath and flicks to the first page. 

In Lavin: the runic word Drake was inscribed within it on the first page. It seems to be the only preamble, as the next page was a miniature portrait of his father’s face, staring at him with the utmost… uncanny look in his eyes. 

Bilbo wonders if this is what he makes other people feel. He flips to the next page, and notices that, on the back of his father’s portrait is a series of notes. Most of it is just general information- height, weight, house, etc. Some of it seems to be personal.

Additionally, there seems to have been at least two different hands at work here. The basic data is written in tiny, neat runes, while what appears to be literal notes on his father’s behavior is inscribed in a cramped messy hand. Impatience? Bilbo thinks not. 

You take your time with a Black Book. He flips the page.

The next one to stare at him is Cyrus. Again, the data recorded for his father is the same here, and the observations are in the same messy hand. He feels a growing pit of dread as every single person he knows and at least has use for shows up in the Black Book. Onyx. Thorin. His parents and his siblings. What he’s guessing to be their children. The dwarves. Mandragora. Archemydes. Lock. At the very back of the book, after the conflict has raged in him and screamed it’s heart out and his own, separate organ found it lacking, reducing the conflict to slow, undulating lava in the bottom of his soul, he sees himself.

All cursed, because he can’t just disable a Black Book. It took time and effort to find exactly how the magic was woven and then to carefully unweave it. They’d only burned the book because it would forever more draw the darkest eye in any room. The magic was already gone. To burn it and it’s object would be to damn them all. 

Bilbo tucked the book into his coat and turned to the dragon.

“Wake.” the seer’s eyes opened, and looked at him, waiting and highly controlled.

“Who else knows of this?” The seer’s eyes go a little more foggy and his smile a little more lopsided, and then:

“The dragon king.” What an odd turn of phrase, since they don’t actually have kings. He snaps his fingers again, and Amadeus falls back asleep.

He remembers the word he’d found in Amadeus’ writings: rookery. It seemed to make sense now. He’d found a flock of birds, cursed to die one by one.

He slides the thing in his coat and rose. It is time to go. He pauses at the door and focuses on the black magic in Amadeus’ heart. He holds up a hand, for concentration, and thinks about it exploding. 

Outwardly, the poor thing has a heart attack. Inwardly, the wayward magic has done it’s work and drawn toward the most powerful source of black magic for miles around: Bilbo himself. The red skinned Reaper vanishes into the night.

  
  


…

 

_ He ran. He vanished into thin air and ran and ran until his lungs hurt. For all that, they still caught him. He wasn’t experienced enough to keep his invisibility up under duress, and so got caught before he made it where he was headed- the ocean of course.  _

_ He had hope that Onyx would be where the ocean’s at. Now, he wouldn’t be able to find out, because something hit his exposed back, and he found himself fading away. _

_ When he opened his eyes again, he was lying on a rectangular bed, the sheets and the earthen walls apart of the same color palet. He sat up and looks around. Onyx appeared in front of him. _

_ “Lock.” The dragon in question started. He hadn’t been aware that he’d been dreaming. _

_ “What?” _

_ “They’ve taken you to Katedraal,” Onyx said, utterly calm. The dream floor seemed to drop out from underneath his dream body and his dream soul seemed to have fall down through his dream organs to drop right out of his dream ass and plunge away into the ether. _

_ Katedraal was the stuff of nightmares to Lock, the looming threat that he’d been afraid of ever since that first accidental illusion all that time ago. It was a great dome-roofed structure that loomed in beauty above ground when it was in the distance, and fear whenever he got close to it or thought of what he knows is the great maze of its subterra rooms. They take the Cursed there that they can’t control outside of it. He’d heard of dragons slitting their own wrists in that place. He felt hands on his face and, this time, jerked, but Onyx’s hold was firm and calming. _

_ “Lock. Lock, I want you to listen very closely. I’m an incubi, remember?” Lock nodded, mute. _

_ “If they take you to the lower levels, remember that dream walking is a little like telepathy, in that it establishes a connection between two minds. I can’t help you now, but the moment you get the chance, find that connection while you’re awake, and I’ll lead you to the ocean. I can set you free, yeah?” _

_ “Yeah.” Onyx nods and, for the first time in forever, arms wrapped protectively around Lock for a moment.  _

_ “I’ll be there when you sleep.” _

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 1: Bilbo, Lock, and the rest of the dragons all speak Lavin, which is my imaginary runic version of Latin, but Katedraal is Africaan for Cathedral, which is just cathedral in latin.   
> On another note, how are you guys enjoying these cliffhangers? They gutting you yet?


	13. Interlude: Important Update

In almost all of my stories, what you actually see is not what all there actually is. Which is why I'm doing this. Here is my tumblr (https://www.tumblr.com/blog/ambiguousrabbitsclock), which will be an AO3 feed for all my fics. If you have a prompt, an alternate event, a question, or any other thing that just won't make it into a finished piece, feel free to ask me for it there. 

-White Rabbit's Clock

P.S. Sorry for the false chapter


	14. Sick Earth

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Lock learns about his predicament, Bilbo has a change in perception.

Who wrote the Black book? From the other writings Amadeus had in his quarters, he’d say that the Seer had written the first part, as if he’d completed the book beforehand. Based on the sheer amount of black magic swirling in his body, he may have done so under a mesmerist’s duress. 

It occurs to him how extreme Cursed can be; they make the best Reapers, and the best Necromancers. Speaking of. If someone was going to aim at the von Thorne family, and include Bilbo by extension, why would they have such a high concentration of black magic? If this really is a power struggle between houses or a group/individual trying to change their fate by breaking the von Thorne House, why the Necromancy? Why the Black Book? Why something that is so very in his territory and power and right to deal with?

For the first time, he considers the idea that this enemy of his family is, in fact, targeting Bilbo by aiming at the only people who had enough sway to pull him back into a place where he is not the apex predator. Not only that, but, somewhere inside his heavily guarded soul, he cares. 

He cared for Thorin, and he cared for his father and siblings and mother. Estranged as he is, it’s a strange mix of pride, duty, and love that overpowers his hatred and disgust with his family. He cares for the dragons of Lavender and Lilac, if in a detached, cold way. This is his homeland. He was born and raised here. The first of his trials by fire took place here. He doesn’t have it in him to leave them to the scourge of black magic.

If Bilbo were trying to hunt a powerful and dangerous man down, he would find out what that man cares for, what he’ll go to great lengths for, and threaten that. If he’s right, then he can no longer afford to conduct his own investigations and keep Archemydes looking after the von Thorne House while he prowls through what is naturally enemy territory.

If they’re targeting him specifically, it’s time to assemble what has become a hodgepodge of allies and those of his profession that would not let him die.

It’s time to rejoin Archemydes and radically change the playing field.

 

…

 

Lock’s eyes pressed into his knees, trying to control the tears. Why? He knew what they said about Curse- how they’re evil, twisted creatures who lie and steal and cheat you out of your everything. But that wasn’t him. 

All he wanted to do was to either be loved or left alone, and he couldn’t have the former, so he’d settled for the latter. And then Victor had decided he’d had enough of waiting. So, after a week in the dark for his “lies and deceit”, he was so tired he could barely stand, but at the same time, so wired he could barely sit. 

This is, in part, because of Onyx. Incubi were the most hated of Cursed, often maimed at the first sign of dream walking. It was a comfort that Onyx had lived through far worse. In Lock’s dreams, that had merely sat on grassy hills or under the long, living hair of a willow tree while Onyx told him of his own experience. 

Onyx told him everything he knew about the Lavender Isles, and everything he knew about the fortress of Katedraal. It had originally been set up as the center of a small island community of dragon refugees of a war long past. 

As the magic in the veins of his ancestors manifested differently, fear grew in each new generation. When Lavender City  was a quarter of its size, civil war tore it apart, those who were labelled conniving, power-hungry liars- mesmerists, shapeshifters, illusionists, telepaths, seers and, more so than any other, incubi- were hunted down and killed, hunted down and tortured, hunted down and interrogated. 

Anything and everything to keep the menace from spreading. For the first time, Katedraal served a more nefarious purpose as a prison for captured Cursed. The labyrinth was constructed almost overnight by a team of four earthbenders, one of which died of a heart attack during the war, as the trick to keeping the prisoners trapped lay in changing the maze every night while also expanding the labyrinth.

It was at this point that the materials of Katedraal and the earth underneath it began to resist. Any object, when handled magically enough, retains a very small amount of magical residue. When handled incorrectly, the residue builds to a point that the over-handled object gains its own concentration of magic that often manifests itself in a very basic way. 

By the end of the war, the layout of Katedraal was final, there were hardly any earthbenders who had not broken themselves in the effort of guarding and altering the greatened structure, and what Cursed had not fled were prisoners in their own homes. Those that did escape were savage beasts of dragons, chasing off what Blessed were on the opposite side of the Archipelago and building their own city slowly and painfully by hand.

Among those who fled were those Blessed who paid the highest costs- the earthbenders who had not died in service, the firebenders who were often pressed into hunting down their own family, the seers who had risked life and limb to not see too much of where the Cursed were at and what they were going to do and those who had lost family to a pointless conflict. 

Thus, Lilac was born, the Katedraal gained its reputation, it’s resistance for magic, and, worst of all, it’s taste for the blood of the damned, as so much of it had been spilled as the earth had resisted movement. It is in the belly of this unalive beast that Lock was imprisoned in, and he was scared shitless.

The endless hours of his “days” spent sweating with the sense that there were eyes. Eyes everywhere. Nights were spent clutching to the dreams masterminded by Onyx. There was no rest to be had. Not until he got out of there.

“Let me tell you what will most likely happen,” Onyx said as they sat with each other on a dream mountaintop, breathing dream air, weaving a real plan out of the insubstantial chance of Lock’s survival.

“They will come for you. I don’t know when, but they will, eventually come. They will wait until you are weak, and so starved for sleep and light and air that you cannot possibly run away. They will transport you to a new cage above ground, if no one sees you immediately, and leave you there. After that, I don’t know what will happen, but it is your only chance.

“If you get caught, taking you back there will be the least of your problems. If you don’t run, you will lose your mind. If you choose a fate other than the one I have offered you, I can no longer help you, though I will be there should you ever veer away from a path that keeps you in Lavender.

“Will you be there if I get caught?”

“I will have to retrieve you myself, which could get both of us killed, as I have no means of hiding myself to sneak in, but yes, I will still be there.” Onyx took a deep dream breath.

“Lock, listen to me.” The dragon turned blue eyes to the burning lava of his only friend.

“I will be there. Remember that. Find the connection. Want it. Need it. Seek it harder than you have ever sought before. When you have it, keep it more closely than you’ve ever kept anything before, and you will be fine, okay?

“We’ll get you out of there, yeah?” Lock nods, leaning, once more, into the hold of Onyx. Then his eyes closed, and he woke, feeling more choked than ever before. The odd thing about dreams was that, when other magic is making him sick, like he was then, he felt as though it never happened.

He pushes the thought away. Now is not the time to doubt the legitimacy of Onyx. If the dragon really isn’t here, what is there to do but to keep going, anyways?

His breath caught and died in his throat. The door to his cell had begun to move.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I bet you guys are tired of my cliffhangers, huh?


	15. Redemption

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Lock makes his escape and Bilbo makes his case.

In the pale, early morning, an invisible wraith of a man watches the still horizon, fully aware that there are invisible dragons and shapeshifters around him. He turns to them. Next to him is Archemydes and Onyx, the most stable of them all. 

Far to the back of the group is Winter, looking far different than he did the last time Bilbo saw him. Bilbo ignores him, but he doesn’t attack. He considers this improvement. 

A green dragon named Water is watching them all, silent. She lost her tongue to the scourge of dragon culture. Now she doesn’t need words to make a man stab himself. 

The drakes gathered here come in all sizes and colors, houses and temperaments. They hail from far beyond the blue mountains to the shores just after the Iron Hills. They are what what Reapers can be spared from the already sparse ranks, and it has taken some effort to get them all here.

It has been months since Bilbo sat down cross legged in front of a clear pool of water and dropped three drops of a dark, inky substance into it, summoning none other than Onyx himself in broad daylight, hours yet from any sleep. His stone black face had appeared, full mouth and thick eyebrows set in a state of mild irritation, which, for him, is actually a lot of irritation, since Onyx doesn’t do facial expressions. In a quiet, steady voice, Bilbo told of all he knew, and a plan was born.

And now they are here. Bilbo steps to the back of the cave, turning with his hand on a large, stone table. It looks like an alter. It is, just not for anything sacred.

“Someone seeks to end me, at the least, and all of you, at the most. I don’t have the time or strength to hunt down every last pocket of black magic in the isles. If you are amiable, we would reap the entire archipelago from Lilac to Lavender and every piece of land in between,” Bilbo says. The rest has already passed from ear to ear, travelled in whispers across thousands of miles and dozens of minds. 

“I say no,” a reaper says. Bilbo nods; this is not just a call to arms. It’s a council for it, as well.

“Aye?” Bilbo responds.

“From what I understand, the only people under attack are the von Thornes which, as I’m sure a lot of you remember, is already riddled with rot in the first place. I suggest we let them fall and let the black magic spread no farther than Lavender. Those left will be too weak to resist an end to this class warfare nonsense.”

“But would it actually be ‘an end’?” Water signs. The runic words appear in midair- an illusion done by the dragon of identical looks next to her. Bilbo waits. The whole cave waits. Then, proudly:

“I doubt it.”

“But you would have us disobey our vows and let it happen anyways.” Onyx says where he has moved to lean against a wall.

“Actually, the only one who would break their vows is him,” the dragon says. (Jinx, Bilbo suddenly recalls).

“You agreed to fight to protect the world of black magic to the best of your abilities. You’re here now. Any that leave over vengance have broken their vows.”

“This is a special case,” says another (Lotus).

“Clearly, which is why this isn’t a breach of promise in the first place.” Jinx moves a dark purple hand and points a single wickedly sharp claw at Bilbo.

“You preach of vows and keeping them, but you let your mentor go mad. Did you leave in anger, Ezra? Did you do what you wanted and not what he needed? Or were you simply unable to do the deed?”

The room devolves into argument then- a few attacking Jinx over the slight, but the majority of the room agreeing with him. Bilbo is the black sheep of the Reaper’s circle- there is no denying that or his mistakes.

Bilbo falls quiet, allowing for the arguing, the tempers, the tension to rise and coil like a thousand snakes all around him for a moment.

“ENOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOUGH!” He says with a roar and a baring of fangs. The room falls quiet, the two or people other than Onyx and Archemydes uncertain as to what he will say next. He points a finger at Jinx and holds his shifting silver gaze with his own magma one. 

“You’re right,” he says, breathing a little hard at the expression. 

“I did fail to kill Lock. I failed more in that moment than I’d ever failed anything else. You know what happened next?” He says. Jinx hesitates, then nods. As a dragon twice Bilbo’s age, he did not expect this response from the runt of the very deadly litter.

“I couldn’t do it anymore. Reaping, I mean, and everything else. I couldn’t be what Lock wanted- needed- me to be, and I couldn’t go on knowing that my temper had cost an entire nation their lives. So I did suck it up. I went to Erebor, and what I saw there was everything I could have stopped,” he says, voice open and raw and more real than most of those gathered had seen in a long time, “and I knew that the chance to kill him was already gone.”

“I had cost a race their people and their fortune, and I knew I needed to give it back to them to even get near some semblance of doing my duty. So I left. I left and I tracked them down to the Blue Mountains and knew that the dwarves I’d wronged so badly were not yet ready to try for Erebor.

“By this time, I was losing my own mind. I found myself getting lost for hours in the darkness of my own mind and it was quickly wearing on me. I knew I needed to disappear if I wanted to live to set things as close to right as possible. So I went to Hobbiton. There I remained until a group of thirteen dwarves and one meddlesome wizard showed up on my doorstep.

“Step by step, they made their way from the Blue Mountains to Erebor, during which we were continuously followed and hunted by the Necromancer Malcolm and Winter, current apprentice to Onyx and formerly a soldier of Lavender and, before all of that, my fiance. During all of this, a seer who I haven’t been able to find has been haunting my steps, trapping me in dreams of the life and times of Lock before he was a reaper.” Bilbo finally stops here and, under the attention of some of the deadliest creatures in Arda, prepares for the end of his speech. 

“Every day since I heard the news, I have paid for it and paid for it and paid for it. When I see one of you and I don’t dare try for anything other than business, it is because I know that I will always be the one who failed. The one who couldn’t keep the promise. I’m sorry, I was sorry, and I will always be sorry.

“But don’t look at me in scorn and then turn your back to the archipelago. Don’t turn your back, because it’s ‘complicated’. Don’t turn your back because I did. I cost an entire nation- already twisted through with corruption from it’s maddening king, yes, but a nation that was worth watching over. One that could have been saved, if I’d only had the mettle to do it. If you leave today, each and every one of you has broken your vows and no one has the right to see me as lesser. 

“I failed because I didn’t have enough. If you walk away now, you are deliberately saying no, and that makes you so much worse than I’ll ever be.” There is, then a long pause as Bilbo catches the eye of every dragon in the room.

“I’m going to stay and do what I can. You are free to join me if you wish. If not, be gone by two dawns from now.”

“Did you ever get named?” Jinx asks in the silence that follows. Bilbo looks at him.

“Yes. I was named Merci.” more silence, and then:

“He looks like a demon king.” Water signs with slender hands, so used to the act that her claws don’t even click together anymore in the finer movements. Jinx, hearing hearing her twin, shrugs a shoulder and steps forwards.

“I’m in.” Archemydes and Onyx join him as well, though the don’t profess their decision; it was made long before this gathering. One by one, the plethora of dragons in all their colors join him on his side of the cave until there is only one.

Winter, tall and broad and dangerous, steps forwards, but does not fully join the group. Under the eyes of everyone, the third apprentice of Onyx held out a cold hand- an offer to bury the hatchet before the real fighting begins. There is a hesitation, and then a red hand meets sky blue in a single, momentous handshake.

“I’m sorry about the collar.” Bilbo smirks. The collar had been removed some months ago, but it left a pale line around his neck. Magic can scar, after all.

“Sorry about the sleep.” They separate, and Bilbo turns to the group and casts the illusion of a map on the wall opposite.

“This is what I know,” he begins, once more a true Reaper.

 

…

 

_ Lock was ready. He was sick and hungry and weak, but he was ready. After all, he had a secret. Illusions weren’t the only thing he learned to do in those many hours alone and free to his own devices.  _

_ The creak and rough slide of stone let him know that they’ve come to get him. The light hurt. He may have been running around with Onyx through dream worlds, but his physical eyes have not seen light for… he didn’t know how long.  _

_ There were guards- four of them, and they saw him to a room with light in it and pushed him into the cage in the corner of the room and close it. He just laid there for a while, waiting for them to leave. A few minute after this happened, the door opened on the far side, and he saw Victor.  _

_ “Lock, love, are you okay?” he said, approaching the cage and kneeling down. Lock, still feeling sick, did not respond. Victor made a mistake, then by unlocking the door and pulling Lock out of the heavy stone bars and into his lap. He rested there, though the sensation of someone touching him after all this time was hard to get acclimated to. _

_ Broad hands held him close and stroked through his dirty, greasy hair. It took work not to melt into the touch. His memory was foggy; tampered with by the sickness of Katedraal.  _

_ “I’m so sorry. I didn’t think it would be this bad,” Victor said. Distantly, it registered that his one time love and current betrayer was trying to plead with him. Distantly, it registered that he should be angry. He supposed he would be later. For now, though, he was exhausted, and they had hardly begun.  _

_ He closed his eyes and tried to fall asleep. Not entirely, no, but enough that Onyx could find him in the dreamscape. They’ve never been able to practice, since there are rumors that magic done consciously can be detected by Katedraal itself, and weakening Lock further was not an option. In theory, though, Lock only had to slip a little bit. Then, Onyx could stay with him in the waking world. _

_ He lost focus, attention and time and physicality sliding just a bit, before something jolted him back to full awareness. _

_ I’m here, Lock. _

_ It was enough.  _

_ He’s not paying attention, now. He is vulnerable.  _

_ Lock tried to open his eyes, see what there was to see, and realized that Victor’s face was contorted into a mix of guilt and pleading and hope. Vulnerable indeed. As subtly as he could, Lock raises one burgundy hand; an invitation. Victor holds it for a moment before running his own hand across a wasted face. For a moment, Lock lost focus again, and then: _

_ NOW! _

_ Lock, whose sharp claws were resting against the face of a man he still loved, just below his cheek, suddenly turns deadly as he digs claws in and pulls down, aiming for the jugular. Victor fell away, bleeding but not enough to kill him. _

_ It’s all Lock needed. He abruptly shifted- an ability he’d kept hidden from Victor, and rightfully so- into a tiny bird.  _

_ Focus. The door is open, but if they see you, you’re dead. _

_ Lock imagined that no one could see him. No one could see him so much that he was not there at all. He disappeared as he flitted through the door. Lock was running out of time, though, because Katedraal is no friendlier above ground than it was below it.  _

_ His tiny bird stomach twisted and curled as Onyx guided him through the rooms and hallways until- yes!- an open window presents his escape. Lock darted through and zips along the sky in a haze of invisible hope until a burst of fire nearly fried him. _

_ He couldn’t maintain invisibility for long, and word travelled fast in the Lavender Isles. So he twisted and dodged, following Onyx’s directions all the way to the sea shore, where he crashed on the sand and ran for it. He tried to remember how he wasn’t there at all, but knew it wasn’t working, as a ball of fire hit him in the back as he collapsed into the knee high waves and shifted into a fish and swam hard and fast towards the nearest island. _

_ As he neared the new sands, he shifted into a person and was drawn from the salty water stinging his burned back and into the arms of his new, better life. _

_ Finally-  _ finally _ \- he falls asleep, exhaustion finally winning out. _

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Second to last chapter, guys! If you're still with me, let me know what you think!


	16. Epilogue

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> What it says on the tin.

_ There’s a child on the shore. He’s a little thing, too. Bright red skin, purple eyes, wild, curling black hair. Victor’s little boy. He doesn’t look very happy, though, for a child of Victor’s. The others are strong and virile and true heirs.  _

_ This one is sad and weakened. Lock knows exactly why. He materializes on shore, much the same as Onyx had all those years ago. _

 

…

 

Bilbo sat in a room with smooth walls, hands palm up on strong thighs, eyes closed. He’s found meditation to be a far better deterrent for madness than anything he could buy or find. Around the room, images from a life long lived- and died- flicker across the walls, melding smoothly into one another as the mind that controls them wanders.

Quite suddenly, he becomes aware that he is not alone, but he does nothing. Not until he hears the click of a small… what did they call it? Oh, yes, a handgun. Not until the click of a small handgun alerts him again to someone’s presence.

“So you really are Redwing,” a voice says as his clear blue eyes travel over the walls, taking in images of times long past.

“The last Redwing, you mean, but yes.” Bilbo says as he opens his eyes, done with thought for now. 

“I thought it odd that you always had just enough information.”

“I deal in black magic. I have all of the information,” Bilbo murmurs. It has been years- thousands, actually, since the last elf left. Thousands of years since the grand apprentices of Archemydes passed out of existence. Bilbo killed one. Taken by the magic, unfortunately. 

Speaking of magic. He can’t decide if incarnation is a good thing. He has seen every one of the company, all of his reaper companions (the ones that weren’t taken by the magic, that is) but never Thorin.

And now he’s standing behind him, prepared to blow his head off.

“The dreams. Are those yours, too?”

“I’m a shapeshifter and illusionist. Not an incubus.”

“They’re of another life. One where everyone was short.” Bilbo smiles. He has waited centuries upon centuries, age upon age, for this moment. 

“It was your life, a very long time ago, when I could still be called a reaper and not Redwing.”

“What happened?”

“Your soul was born tired. You died achieving what you felt had to be gotten, and I waited this long before you appeared again. And now you’re about to kill me.” Bilbo says, standing and turning around. He hides a grin.

At long last, Thorin Oakenshield has returned.


End file.
